Edward frowned. “I think Marshal Forrester should not come to the meeting,” Flannery said.
“Where Anita goes, I go.”
“You’re not magical enough, Forrester. I’m sorry, but the wee folk prefer different energy.”
“If they don’t like you, they won’t meet with you,” Nolan said.
“I don’t want Anita going alone,” Edward said.
“You and I can wait in the car, but we can’t go in if the Fey say no. If we try to crash the meeting, they won’t help us.”
“Anita is not going alone,” Edward repeated.
“Oh, she won’t be alone. They want to meet some of the people she brought to our shores,” Flannery said.
“Like who?” I asked.
Flannery flashed me a bright smile. “I’ll give you a list.”
“Jake needs to be on that list,” Edward said.
That surprised me. I’d have thought he’d say Nicky.
We finally got to leave the hallway. Mort went to medical, though I was pretty sure he was fine. It wasn’t until Edward wanted to include Jake in our meeting that I began to think we were going to talk about more than just containing the prisoners. I was pretty sure I knew why he wanted to include the only werewolf we had brought with us. Edward had noticed Nolan losing control for that moment in the hallway. If anyone in the group knew Nolan’s secret, I was betting it was Flannery. When you work with what amounts to nature spirits, it’s hard to miss a werewolf. If he had missed it, then my opinion of Flannery’s magical abilities was going to be low before we ever started comparing notes.
47
WE SETTLED IN the back of the truck, which was beginning to feel like our home away from home, for privacy, and I put Domino up front with the driver. Flannery told me that not everyone could go in to meet and greet, but I was free to bring more people, so I did.
“Safety tip: Don’t admit to being able to see the gentle folk unless Flannery asks a direct question,” Nolan said.
“Why not?” Nicky asked.
“Because not all of them like being spied on, and back in the old days, they’d ask which eye you could see them with and blind you in that eye.”
“I’m already down an eye,” he said.
“We’ll talk about what we saw and didn’t see when we’re all alone and inside somewhere in the city,” I said.
“That would be best,” Nolan said. We’d already asked Nolan, and Flannery was the only one of his people who knew his secret, so we could talk freely about that, at least.
I wasn’t sure how to start the talk, but Flannery was. “Before we talk other magic, we should discuss what happened with Captain Nolan in the hallway.”
Nolan startled badly enough I could tell from the back. “I don’t know what you mean, Flannery.”
“Captain, please, I felt your wolf stronger than I’ve felt it in months.”
“No one else noticed.”
“I did,” I said.
“You felt my beast, because you have your own.”
“I saw your eyes change, Brian,” Edward said.
Nolan looked at him. “You did not.”
“You were so busy trying not to flash the color change down the hall toward your people that you didn’t think I was standing beside you. I saw your eyes change, but I felt the energy roll off you, too.”
“You never felt it when we worked together in the past.”
“I didn’t know what I was feeling back then. I’d barely started working with preternatural stuff. I have years more practice under my belt, and I know what I felt.”
“How could you differentiate between me, Blake, Sanderson, Murdock, or Jones?”
“I’ve worked with Anita too long not to know what her energy feels like; same for Murdock. The others not as much, but I still knew how many shapeshifters were in that hallway from the feel of their energy. I’ll be honest: if I hadn’t seen your eyes I wouldn’t have been sure it was you, but I would have known it had to be either you or Mortimer, because that’s the direction I was sensing it from.”
“All right, so you sensed me.”
“Is it just being around so many other people with similar gifts that roused your wolf?” Flannery asked.
“No.” This from Jake.
“What was it, then?” Nolan asked, and he was a little defensive like Brennan had been inside.
“When is the last time you were around a woman of your kind?” Jake asked.
“I see my mother at least once a month.”
Jake smiled, gently, as if he were trying to lead him through something hard. “No, I mean a woman who is someone you could have a romantic relationship with, Captain Nolan.”
“Years.”
“Have you been around any female werewolves that are like me?”
“Only to fight them in other countries.”
“So, again, no chance for romance.”
“I suppose not.”
“Then Anita is the first she-wolf you have met in years who isn’t trying to kill you, or isn’t closely related to you.”
“Are you saying that my wolf reacted that strongly just because she’s a female wolf?”
“Something like that.”
He shook his head. “I’m not saying you’re wrong, Pennyfeather, but I haven’t reacted that way to a she-wolf since I was a teenager. Why now?”